my sousaphone is already broken… well, more broken… and because of the fact that i have absolutely no room, even to simply turn around, much less actually manhandle something as large as a sousaphone, this is all the repair work i can do to it. i’ve already taken it completely apart once, so i could hone the valves (i had to store most of the parts on the living room couch and chair when i had the valve cluster off), because otherwise the first valve was sticking pretty badly. please note: i am not showing this repair because i am proud of it, i am showing it as a way of showing what my tiny, cramped space has reduced me to. yes, you’re seeing right, here: those are zip-ties holding the horn together. i had to reinforce it with something, and i don’t have room to do stuff like solder, in spite of the fact that, if i did have room, soldering it would be the repair of choice, and would only take about 10 minutes.

needless to say, i’m depressed, in spite of the fact that i sold a beaded sivalingam necklace. a good deal of my depression is because things like this, and things like it, and other political things closer to home, are still leaking in to my realm of consciousness, in spite of the fact that i’ve been making a concerted effort to keep them out. it’s gonna take a lot more than one sivalingam necklace to make up for that.